Having a bullhorn is nice, but workers need more to elevate their voices.
AP Photo/David Goldman)
Although over 200 CEOs have promised to share windfalls from the recent tax cut with their employers – something the president is likely to bring up in the State of the Union – research suggests workers aren’t holding their breath.
Slightly more optimistic economic figures gives Scott Morrison and the Turnbull government a boost heading into 2018, as the charts explain.
Lukas Coch/AAP and The Conversation
Seven charts on the highlights from the government’s mid year update of the budget.
Retail Food Group (RFG) Managing Director Andre Nell (right) and Chairman Colin Archer. The company has been the focus of the latest investigation into franchise problems.
Dan Peled/AAP
There are some hallmark problems within franchising in Australia and internationally and not all are within the franchisor’s or franchisees’ control to fix.
Politicians like Malcolm Turnbull try to target middle class Australians.
Lukas Coch/AAP
Use our calculator to work out whether you’re an “average” Australian where you live.
Post-war Australia experienced a boom with full employment and falling inequality.
State Library of Queensland
The federal government could restore its commitment to creating full employment in Australia, using its spending power to make up for any shortfall in private jobs as it did during the post-war boom.
Treasurer Scott Morrison is eager to point out jobs growth, but wages growth remains stubbornly slow.
Daniel Munoz/AAP
The narrative that Australia has “transitioned from the mining boom successfully” seems a lot like wishful thinking.
shutterstock.
italianestro/Shutterstock
Putting money into the hands of local communities will be a more useful antidote to the whims of world capitalism.
Shoppers browse at a Sears Canada store in Toronto in October after the company began liquidation sales. Its retirement funds are short $308 million, forcing a 19 per cent cut to employee pensions.
(THE CANADIAN PRESS/Nathan Denette)
Sears Canada’s bankruptcy should alert employees and regulators alike to rethink defined-benefit pensions.
Where are the benefits from all that hard work?
Shutterstock
Workers are more productive than ever and earning the same amount. So shouldn’t they be working less?
AAP
Treasurer Scott Morrison recently asserted that an increase in profits is a prerequisite for wages growth. But is his position supported by data?
Is the jobs glass half full or half empty?
via shutterstock.com
Liberal Democrat leader Vince Cable claims there is no evidence that immigration impacts wages. Is he right?
Since the mid 1970s and especially since the 1980s the job market changed and so did how our wages are set.
Ryan Derry/Flickr
Austraila’s minimum wages now operate in relative isolation. Until the 1990s they were part of an inter-connected system.
Imported goods could be partly to blame for low wage growth.
Julian Smith/AAP
There are two ways that international competition can reduce wages. Both are effects of globalisation.
So many of the factors influencing low wages growth for Australian workers are also an important influence on CEO pay, although not necessarily in the same way.
ANGELA BRKIC/AAP
Data shows that growth in total CEO pay has outstripped average Australian wage growth in every year of the last five years. But perhaps we need to look more closely.
The option of “holding out” for a permanent job looks increasingly risky as these opportunities dwindle.
Lukas Coch/AAP
The costs of casual work are now outweighing the slim benefits in wages (and even those are not as much as they used to be).
Business leaders in ASX categories relying on household spending, have stronger than average positive outlook on the future.
Dan Peled/AAP
The sentiment of business leaders has remained positive and improved over the past 12 months according to our analysis.
Jimmy John’s tried to stop its workers from toiling for other sandwich makers.
AP Photo/David Goldman
Nearly one in five employed Americans is bound by a contract restricting moves to rival companies. Here’s one way to make those arrangements less common.
The region with the most unequal incomes in Australia is Melbourne City, where the top 20% have an income that is 8.3 times as high as those in the bottom 20%.
Dan Peled/AAP
Census data shows there is income inequality between, but also within, regions of Australia.
All public sector workers have a 1% pay rise cap.
Peter Byrne/PA Wire/PA Images
A deep dive into public sector earnings data since 2005 and how it compares to private sector pay.
Analysis shows that while land values per acre rose at 2.2% per annum, land rents fell by 0.3% per annum in the 1800s.
Powerhouse Museum/Flickr
The experience of Australia’s first century shows that it’s possible to achieve fast growth, and at the same time, a reduction in inequality.
Despite what RBA chief Philip Lowe says, asking for a pay rise isn’t so simple for many employees.
Shutterstock
Building negotiating power is crucial for anyone looking to ask for a pay rise. But for those who can’t, perhaps it’s the employers’ responsibility to ensure fair compensation.
Pay rise? Why not, says the RBA governor.
Lukas Coch/AAP
For a whole lot of workers in Australia, cutting a better pay deal is very hard.
Treasurer Scott Morrison called a press conference this week to comment on March-quarter GDP figures.
Mick Tsikas/AAP
Treasurer Scott Morrison says Australia will “grow into growth”. Global economic conditions suggest otherwise.
One’s based on average earnings growth, the other on living standards.
Nick Ansell/PA Wire/PA Images
Crucially, they differ in how they are calculated and the ages of workers that they apply to.
The treasurer referred to the A$13 billion “zombie” measures the Senate has failed to pass as a “Senate tax”, in justifying the tax increases in this budget.
Lukas Coch
The budget was extraordinary in many ways. It is an abandonment of restraint on taxes by a liberal government. It is nakedly populist and it also acknowledges that government debt can be productive.